


For the right price

by ryybonko



Category: Shadowhunters (TV), The Mortal Instruments Series - Cassandra Clare
Genre: Alec Lightwood-centric, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Dark Magnus Bane, F/M, Immortal Alec Lightwood, Immortality Issues (Shadowhunter Chronicles), M/M, Non Canonical Immortal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-15
Updated: 2019-05-15
Packaged: 2020-03-05 21:48:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 744
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18837427
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ryybonko/pseuds/ryybonko
Summary: Magnus knows that one day Alec will return to him because he won't have anyone else.





	For the right price

— You, — Magnus murmurs and shrugs nonchalantly, like it is something so simple, so lightly achieved. Like Alec can say "screw Clave, screw rules, screw everything" and throw himself in warlock's hands. Like he doesn't have his pride — not shadowhunter's pride but just human sense of self-worth. Sometimes Alec doesn't understand him. Words form in Magnus mouth, all soft and quiet, words that Alec knows and uses — maybe not so perfectly, like Magnus does but uses nonetheless. Alec wants to kiss that words from Magnus' lips, from the curve of his mouth, because he knows the words but he doesn't understand the meaning of them. Sometimes he wonders if Magnus speaks another language, maybe demonic one that somehow sounds like English but each word holds a different meaning from it. Maybe one day Alec will learn that language and finally, finally, will understand what Magnus was saying all along. But not today.

— Wh-what? — he stumbles and blushes and can't form a coherent sentence, because Magnus' gaze is so dark and intense and yet so... So real, like a touch, like a breath on skin. — I can't, Magnus, — desperately pleads Alec. — You know I can't. 

It feels like a lie on his tongue. If the Clave representative was here, not Alec, then, maybe, they would trade him for the warlock's magic. The Clave needs it and Magnus is the best of the best. The Clave would certainly put many shadowhunters' lifes above Alec's. Maybe Alec is selfish, maybe Alec is scared, but he can't do this. He feels dirty, just thinking about offering his life and his weapons to anyone. He thought that Magnus and he could have something. Something still unnamed, tender, like the warmth Alec feels in his chest every time he catches Magnus looking at him. But this — this offer — it feels like it has broken something. He doesn't know what Magnus needs a trained shadowhunter for and it scares him. He doesn’t want to kill Bane’s enemies mindlessly, to be just a sword in warlock’s hands.

— No, — Alec whispers and turns to leave. Magnus giggles behind him.

— You will return, Alexander, — this words don't feel like an empty promise. — One day, you will return, because one day you won't have anyone except me.

Alec doesn't look back.

Warlock Rey is nice and understanding, he can be trusted — as much as a shadowhunter can trust a downworlder. Clave doesn’t refuse his demands for payment, sending gold and jewelry and Idris’ herbs in return for his help. His magic is strong and the enchantments on the Institute building are high quality and good enough to stay for decades. Warlock Rey works with the Institute representatives for years. He is there to help when Sebastian almost kills Alec’s wife Lydia, he is there when demons run freely through New York streets and cause chaos and he is there when one day Alec looks in the mirror and understands something, terrified.

He is not aging.

When Izzy’s face is not so youthful anymore — she is still beautiful, as a weapon can be, but there is small wrinkles near her eyes now, when Jace grumbles about old pain in his knee joint, Alec is still young, like a fly trapped in amber. He never thought something like this could happen to him — hunters’ lives are short and bright. They die young — they die. They just die when their fate decides that’s enough and they don’t regret it.

Alec now can’t have that luxury. 

People notice, of course they notice. It is a torture — every glance and every comment, fellow shadowhunters gossiping about his immortality, about his relationship with his wife and the lack of children. He knows that it is not something that came with his immortality, just his overall inability to sleep with a woman, but that hurts nonetheless. Alec is a shadowhunter, always was, not a warlock, like some hunters whisper. 

His luck is unbelievable — any wound, any injury is superficial, he comes back from patrols where everyone else dies.

He never wanted that.

Clave is wary of him and one day, when Lydia is long gone and he doesn’t have parabatai rune anymore, Alec leaves. Glamoured, disguised, he travels in the primitive world like a shadow, not staying anywhere long enough to attach to places and people. He repeats to himself that he is strong and can live on and on and on.

Alec is strong.

He comes to Magnus two hundred years later.


End file.
